What does your desk say about you? Richard McCready-Hughes

In this series Design Insider will be speaking to designers, architects and directors to find out more about their working space and what this says about them. We caught up with Richard McCready-Hughes, Creative Director at Goddard Littlefair.

Goddard Littlefair is a London-based, luxury interior design studio, established in 2012 by Martin Goddard and Jo Littlefair.

For me, thinking on paper is fundamental to solving a spatial conundrum, refining a specific detail or designing a piece of furniture. It buys me time to consider things more thoroughly. There is always a roll of tracing paper and a blank paged notebook on my desk… Pens, however, escape and elude me; where do they go, they’re like socks!? 

I use tape measures to assess proportions and the way individual elements of a design scheme relate to each other in real space. Getting the mechanics of this right is essential from both an aesthetic and a practical point of view. The correct sense of proportion is essential to the successful design of a space, but no-one will want to spend time in it if it’s uncomfortable and doesn’t function properly. Tactility and the focus on experiential ‘touch points’ are qualities that are extremely important to us. They’re one of the key ways that we imbue a sense of luxury and sensuality in our work. We also seem to be re-discovering the value of natural, crafted materials and pieces which have taken time and skill to produce. 

I’ve reached an age where I can’t read or work on a screen without the aid of glasses. I’ve given up investing in expensive frames, having lost so many pairs on building sites. Instead I buy multiple pairs which are strategically placed so they’re ready to hand in jacket pockets and in various places around my home. I leave a pair permanently on my desk. 

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